The Afterimage

The poems of Levin's second collection (after Temples and Fields) embrace loss and rapture. Meticulously observant, she captures the paradox of our connection with and distance from others. After sitting comfortably on a subway ride between two women, one reading a bible and one spinning a small globe, she encounters a man-``ill-kempt, jagged, harsh,/ And capable of violence...''-whose isolation suggests ``he'd never been touched/ By the world and its words.'' She readily sees the significant in such dailiness as making beet soup. Plumbing the classics, religious themes and personal memories, she searches almost religiously, although she rejects ``the easy/ Mysticism of my classmates'' and formulas for easy solace. Levin speaks powerfully from a place ``Between detachment and wonder.'' (Nov.)